The U.S. Bureau of Land Management next week will auction off access of up to 365 million tons of coal across Campbell and Converse counties in the first major Wyoming coal lease sale in a decade.
Up for grabs is about 3,508 acres of federal coal reserves in the Powder River Basin about 15 miles south of Wright. The BLM wrote in a planning document it expects the “recoverable/ minable” amount of coal to be around 365 million tons.
The agency said it will accept no less than $100 per acre for the coal, but hopes to only approve “the highest cash bid that meets or exceeds fair market value.”
Other planning documents outline the fact that the BLM’s plan coincides with an executive order from President Donald Trump on “unleashing American energy.” It also cites the Trump administration’s massive spending omnibus, the One Big,= Beautiful Bill, as permitting the U.S. Secretary of the Interior to begin such lease projects.
The West Antelope III coal lease will go to auction Oct. 8.
Advocate Concerns
Donna Birkholz is the executive director of the Powder River Basin Resource Council, a group that describes itself as being dedicated to the “responsible development of Wyoming’s energy resources.”
Birkholz told Cowboy State Daily her group is concerned that the lease appears poorly planned in several critical areas that could have detrimental impacts on the state.
She highlighted what the group sees as a lack of eligible bidders. This could lead to an uncompetitive auction and dampen the potential monetary gains achieved through such a process, said Birkholz.
“Our concern about this project is we’re not certain there is a market for this lease,” she said. “We’re not sure that there’s a reason to be offering the lease.”
Birkholz also warned that decreased federal royalty rates on energy developments would lead to diminished state and federal returns on the lease. This, she argued, could harm education and other critical services on which Wyomingites depend.
“That’s funding that goes into education and other efforts around the state and we rely on that money,” she said. “This lease is being offered at a discount from the perspective of the people of Wyoming. In terms of the return, it’s not going to be commensurate with previous returns on leases.”
Her group, Birkholz said, is also worried about the potential environmental impacts of opening mining operations in the area. Mining, she said, could pollute air, water and soil while negatively affecting those who live in the surrounding area.
These detriments, she claimed, have been well documented over time and are clear reasons not to proceed with the lease.
“We have decades of history of seeing [environmental] impacts and a history of working to mitigate those impacts,” she said. “We don’t expect that the potential impacts have changed.”
Mine Away
Texas-based geologist and practicing geophysicist Andrew Davidoff told Cowboy State Daily he predicts the lease will have a “very good impact” on the state given the amount of money it will infuse into the economy.
Coal revenues for years supported the state’s public education system.
Bidding processes, Davidoff added, also tend to drive up the price of the item being offered, which could lead BLM to secure a higher price for the coal than expected.
“It’s going to put a lot of people to work,” he said of the lease. “I think it’s a win-win all around.”
Davidoff noted that with increased energy demand in the country, renewable energy installations won’t be able to keep pace with developments like cryptocurrency and artificial intelligence. The country, he said, needs more energy from a variety of renewable and nonrenewable sources.
In response to environmental concerns, Davidoff also asserted that both federal regulations and advances in safe mining techniques can help mitigate the most severe environmental impacts.
“The rules and regulations are well established, the technologies are well established,” he said. “We’re not back in the 1950s where we’re sending tons of ash and smoke into the air. There’s lots of technologies to make sure that we’re filtering out all of the major pollutants.”
Even with decreased royalties, Davidoff argued that increases in production can potentially make up for the lost funds.
Coal Is King
The lease comes on the heels of an announcement by the Trump administration that it plans to inject $625 million into American coal developments and open 13 million acres of federal land for coal leases.
Among those cheering the move was Gov. Mark Gordon, who described it as a “win-win-win” for Wyoming. He highlighted the ability of “clean coal” to bolster energy affordability and security across the country.
Coal, however, is proving a complicated energy source on several critical fronts.
Gordon said on Tuesday he recognizes the impact of coal on state carbon emissions, confirming to reporters during a virtual press conference “there’ll be more CO2 production” with increased coal mining in the state.
The governor also acknowledged the fact that decreased royalties will lead to tightened education spending, while he supports keeping public education well-funded. This, he added, is just one element contributing to a coming state budget session that appears fraught with challenges for legislators to solve.
“The state has got a number of features of reduced revenues to it that are going to make this a very interesting budget session,” Gordon said.
The governor last week told Cowboy State Daily he remains an advocate of coal, oil and gas, but also recognized the impact of renewable wind and solar developments. He urged leaders to balance the concerns of constituents with industrial growth ambitions when making critical energy decisions.
“I think there was a bridge crossed some time ago that promoted wind and that there was a rush to try to develop it, perhaps too quickly,” he said. “For some of us you say, 'This is a landscape that’s now being changed by these windmills, we’re losing something.’”
“It is that tension about private property rights,” he said. “If my neighbor has oil and gas and he can do that, why can’t I do my wind?”
Jackson Walker can be reached at walker@cowboystatedaily.com.
